Day 60: Renewing the Sectional StruggleBaltimore Polytechnic Institute

December 11, 2012A/A.P. U.S. History

Mr. Green

Objectives: Indicate how the Whig party’s disintegration over slavery signaled

the end of nonsectional political parties.Describe how the Pierce administration, as well as private American

adventurers, pursued numerous overseas and expansionist ventures primarily designed to expand slavery.

Describe Americans’ first ventures into China and Japan in the 1850s and their diplomatic, economic, cultural, and religious consequences.

Describe the nature and purpose of Douglas’s Kansas-Nebraska Act, and explain why it fiercely rekindled the slavery controversy that the Compromise of 1850 had been designed to settle.

AP FocusNot content with the land gained from Mexico, southerners look to

Central America and the Caribbean for possible slave states. Central America is also seen as an ideal location for a canal connecting the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, a project a future generation will undertake.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act, orchestrated by Senator Stephen A. Douglas for political as well as personal reasons, further polarizes the nation. Northerners conclude that, with popular sovereignty, there will be no limitations placed on the expansion of slavery.

Renewing the Sectional Struggle

CHAPTER THEMESIn the 1850s, American

expansionism in the West and the Caribbean was extremely controversial because it was tied to the slavery question.

Commercial interests guided American foreign policy in Asia and contributed to sectional tension within the United States, as regions tried to secure the terminus to a transcontinental railroad.

Chapter Focus

Mexican War Chart-due todayElection Charts 1852 & 1856, 1860 &1864

Work on for next weekDecades Chart 1850’s-for next week

Announcements

Identify the components of the Compromise of 1850.

How will this impact future slavery questions?

Evaluate the effectiveness of the Compromise of 1850.

Drill

Election of 1852DemocratsFranklin PierceNew HampshireWeak/IndecisiveServed in Mexican WarEndorsed: Compromise

of 1850, Fugitive Slave Law

254 Electoral Votes

WhigsWinfield ScottAblest general of his

generationPraised Compromise of

1850, Fugitive Slave Law

Split on slavery42 Electoral VotesMarked the end of the

Whigs

Defeat and Doom for the Whigs

Central America a concern after the gold rush and Mexican War

The dream of a continuous Atlantic to Pacific transportation route aroused debate

Britain seized San Juan del Norte (Nicaragua’s Mosquito Coast)

Caused a treaty between the U.S. and New Granada(Columbia)U.S. the right of transit across the Isthmus by maintaining the “perfect neutrality” of the route for free trade

Transcontinental Railroad completed in 1855 though the Panamanian jungle

Clayton-Bulwer Treaty-U.S. and Britain would not seek exclusive control over a future Isthmain waterway

Expansionist Stirrings South of the Border

Central America

Southern slavocrats wanted to push slavery south into Central America by acquiring land.

William Walker-tried to take Baja California Took Nicaragua and installed himself as President

U.S. withdrew recognition and he was executed in 1860 by a Honduran firing squad

Cuba another enticing slavery acquisitionPolk offered $100 million to Spain

1850-1851 feeble takeovers ended in disasterSpain took American Steamer Black Warrior in 1854Ostend Manifesto-$120 million for Cuba. If not, and the

continued Spanish ownership endangered American interests, the U.S. would be right in forcefully taking the land

On to Central America

Caleb Cushing sent by President Tyler in early 1844

Signed the Treaty of Wanghia-1st formal diplomatic treaty between the U.S. and China

Matthew C. Perry sent by President FillmoreUsed grace and fear to finalize the Treaty of Kanagawa on March 31, 1854

The Allure of Asia

Transportation to newly acquired lands imperative to keep them in the union

All sorts of solutions….even camelsRailroads the only solutionWhere to build this railroad??? The South? The

North?Best routes south of the Mexican BorderSecretary of War Jefferson Davis arranged James

Gadsden, a railroad man to negotiate with Santa Anna

Purchased a small area for $10 million

Pacific Railroad Promoters/Gadsden Purchase

Proposed Southern RR line

Kansas and Nebraska, 1854

Stephen Douglass envisioned a line of settlements across the continent

He also owned Chicago real estate and railroad stock.

Proposed the Nebraska Territory be sliced into 2-Kansas and Nebraska

Utilized popular sovereignty to decide slaveryFlew in face of Missouri Compromise

Douglas’s Kansas-Nebraska Scheme

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Homework